Montez’s face changed, took on resolve. “I enjoyed seeing you suffer, McBride. Do you remember when you broke down and cried like a little boy?”
“I warned you what would happen if you went off-topic.” Nathan grabbed him by the ponytail and forced his head back against the seat. Starting at the top of Montez’s right temple, he drew his Predator down his cheek and stopped at his chin. The incision began oozing blood.
Montez hissed in protest, but held still.
“Did you enjoy that?”
“It changes nothing.”
“Oh, I disagree. I’m already feeling better. Shall we make it a matched set?”
Montez said nothing.
“It’s a little cramped in here. Let’s step outside where we have more room to work.” He sheathed the knife, grabbed Montez by the collar, and yanked him across the seat. “I should’ve brought rubber gloves. Lord only knows what diseases you’ve got.” He hauled the man clear of the cruiser and dragged him over the curb toward the riprap-lined harbor channel.
He heard it then, the distant thumping of a helicopter’s main rotor tearing through the air. He looked toward Lindbergh Field. How much time did he have? Two minutes? Less?
To his surprise, he didn’t care.
“You tortured me in front of women and children. What kind of a sick fuck does that?”
“You should know.”
“We’re nothing alike.”
“I should’ve let my man bullwhip you to death. Twenty or thirty more lashes would’ve done the trick.”
“You had a nice head of hair, Monty. Until now.” With his left hand, he snapped the rubber band securing Montez’s ponytail and grabbed a handful of hair just above his brows. With his right hand, he positioned his Predator on the left side of Montez’s forehead and forced the knife across, cutting a deep channel, five inches long. Montez moaned as blood began oozing down his face.
“Professional question,” he growled in Montez’s ear. “Have you ever scalped anyone?”
Headlights appeared. From the left.
Nathan looked up as a sedan bore down on him.
A police cruiser? No, it didn’t have a light bar. Grangeland. Her timing couldn’t have been worse.
It came to a stop behind the cruiser he’d stolen. He heard two car doors open and close. Two doors? Maybe it wasn’t Grangeland. An undercover SDPD unit? He shrugged off any concern and turned his attention back to his prisoner.
“Nathan. Don’t do it.”
Holly?
How could that be Holly? She’s in Sacramento.
Silhouetted against the headlights, she and Grangeland approached the curb, but stopped short. “Nathan, don’t do it.”
“Holly. How- What are you doing here?”
“I never left. I asked your father and Harvey not to tell you.”
Montez grinned through a face covered in blood from his cheek and scalp wounds. “So this is Holly. Julio mentioned you, from the Clairemont house. Quite a looker. And good with a gun, I hear.”
Nathan voice held venom. “Shut up, Montez.”
“Tell me, McBride. Is she a tiger in the sack? I’ll bet she could handle an entire NBA basketball team, plus that cane.”
“Nathan, don’t. It’s what he wants.”
In two labored motions, he cut deep parallel channels along the top of Montez’s head that connected to the slit across his forehead. He could now tear a huge rectangular piece of Montez’s scalp back.
Grangeland took a step a forward. “I don’t blame you for wanting to hurt him, but let us prosecute him for murder.”
“This doesn’t concern the FBI.”
“Is that all I am to you now? The FBI?”
“Grangeland, no, I–I didn’t mean it like that.”
Holly softened her tone. “She’s right, Nathan.”
“Don’t-”
“Don’t what? Deny you your revenge?”
“This isn’t about revenge. It’s about justice.”
“You’ve never lied to me. Are you going to start now?”
He squinted, but said nothing. The truth? Was it absolute? Black or white? Where did it blur?
“So that’s it,” she continued. “I’m too late. You made up your mind a week ago. Then, go ahead. I won’t stop you. But you’ll have to kill him in front of me and Grangeland.”
He clenched his teeth.
“Go ahead. I want to see it. All of it. I want to see you tear his scalp back. I want to see you cut his throat. Listen to the gurgling of his lungs. Everything. I want to see the real Nathan McBride in action. I guess the man I thought I knew doesn’t exist.”
“Holly, don’t-”
“Don’t what? Tell you the truth?”
“What do you know about the truth?” he yelled.
Her voice softened. “I know that giving into hatred won’t heal you. Just the opposite.”
“You know what he did to me.”
“Yes, I do.”
The temptation to tear Montez’s scalp back and slit his throat overpowered all else. It raged like a thirst, a thirst he knew well. He would’ve sold his soul for a drink of water during his crucifixion. With every crack of the whip, every jolt of electricity, and every slice of his flesh, he’d sworn to get revenge some day. He’d dreamed of this moment thousands of times. That day had arrived. Montez must die. And why shouldn’t he? After what he’d done to Kramer. The Dalton family. The bastard tried to kill Harv. Shot him when he was defenseless. Human life had no value to Montez. None.
He gripped the knife tighter.
It would be so easy. So satisfying.
But what about Holly and the life they’d started together? Was he going to throw that away? Was killing Montez worth sacrificing that future? Her future?
He felt a hand on his shoulder.
“Nathan, love is stronger than hate.”
Conflicting emotions assaulted him again. His desire to kill Montez had never burned so strongly. How could they blame him? How could anyone on the planet blame him? He thought back to Director Cantrell’s visit to his hospital room. She’d asked him to consider the bigger picture when and if the time ever came. He owned Montez’s life. Was it satisfying enough to know he could kill him? Was having the power of life and death over this monster enough? It didn’t feel like enough, not by a long shot.
He could almost hear Harvey telling him this wasn’t a CIA sanctioned mission and he didn’t have a green light to take out the target. Thorny would say the same thing.
And what if Montez wasn’t lying about the thumb drive? About having other copies? Killing him could cause serious harm to the country. Did his lust for revenge overshadow all else? How many good people would be destroyed by killing one bad person?
The fork in the road branched in two directions.
One toward light.
The other toward darkness.
With clenched teeth, he tilted his head up, closed his eyes.…
And asked God for help.
He saw them then, in his mind’s eye. Autumn colored leaves. Descending like harbingers of truth. The leaves fell by the hundreds. Then by the thousands. Surrounding him in random but beautiful patterns. They brushed his skin, healing savaged flesh from a past that no longer controlled him, no longer held his fate.
He loosened his grip on the knife.
Love is stronger than hate.
A lot stronger. He’d been so misguided all these years. Bitterness? Hatred? Revenge? Deep down, where only the truth lived, he knew they weren’t just words. They’d become prison bars. He thought about the words inscribed on the FBI seal-words that Holly honored. Fidelity. Bravery. Integrity. And they weren’t merely words. They were tenets of the truth, a truth he’d lost sight of. He could never face Holly again if he gave into his dark nature. Hatred and rage might be permanent parts of his soul, but they didn’t have to control him.
He slammed the door on the other and threw the knife aside.